Emergency personnel carried Sen. Mitch McConnell to an ambulance on a stretcher after he was called to his home last month on a report of an unconscious man, according to new video of the incident and an eyewitness account.
McConnell’s neighbor told CNN they answered the door to find a commotion outside their home around 8:30 a.m. on June 14, with two ambulances, a fire truck and Capitol Police officers blocking the entire street.
Video taken by a neighbor shows rescuers carrying a man on a stretcher to an ambulance. The video was filmed from some distance and the person’s face is not visible. In the ambulance, the man’s lower legs appear to be covered by an orange blanket, but his feet are visible.
The neighbor said they asked officers what was going on and they said it was a “medical emergency.” But when a neighbor asked if McConnell needed emergency medical attention, police said they would close the street to anyone. The neighbor said they learned from another witness who saw the man’s face that the man on the stretcher was McConnell and was not wearing an oxygen mask.
The neighbor’s video and account had not previously been reported. They offer new details about the circumstances surrounding McConnell’s hospitalization, which are shrouded in mystery. When the incident first occurred, a spokesman said only that McConnell was “admitted to the hospital this morning” and was “receiving excellent care.”
Weeks later, McConnell’s team still has not revealed what prompted the senator to be taken to the hospital, nor has it released specific details about his condition. And while friends and former colleagues told reporters they had spoken with McConnell in recent days, they also offered no details about his health.
A spokesman for McConnell declined to comment.
A neighbor who spoke to CNN said he saw emergency personnel carry a man on a stretcher out of McConnell’s home about 30 minutes after they first noticed emergency vehicles blocking the street. Neighbors said they were stunned that the man’s legs were found in the video. McConnell’s home, whose address CNN has confirmed in public records, is visible in video taken the day his team said he was hospitalized.
“He’s on a stretcher and wearing what looks like an orange foam blanket,” the neighbor said. The neighbor said they looked at McConnell’s legs, which were bare and – for a moment – “not moving.”
The neighbor said that although they did not see McConnell’s face, others in the neighborhood did.
“One of my neighbors was like, ‘Oh yeah, that’s Mitch, I saw his face,'” the neighbor told CNN.
Ambulance audio released by an independent journalist showed that emergency responders were called to McConnell’s Washington, D.C., home to an “unconscious” man in “cardiac arrest” and someone could be heard saying, “CPR being performed.”
A neighbor said rescuers worked quickly, but they didn’t seem to notice any panic.
“In a situation where perhaps time is of the essence, there seems to be a little more urgency, but there was no urgency here,” a neighbor told CNN.
As the ambulances left the street, a neighbor said they didn’t have their sirens on.
McConnell’s lengthy hospitalization sparked considerable online speculation about his condition. Some senior Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader John Thune, have issued statements saying they recently spoke with McConnell. CNN senior political commentator Scott Jennings told CNN’s Kasey Hunt on “Arena” that he spoke with McConnell on the phone Tuesday and his “voice was loud and McConnell was feeling good – apparently well enough to call me on the phone.”